Hi all, My name is Eirik Stensbøl, I am 16 years old and in the final year of US high school. I recent moved the the states to do a year of school here, what I did not know was that in the final year of high school all students do a big project called "The senior project". Essentially this is a big project that I am going to work on till Christmas. It involves; several papers of research, oral presentations, interviews, and so forth.
I am having real trouble deciding what I should write about. I really want to write about Starcraft II and a E-Sports scene, but I am afraid that I will be looked upon as a weirdo and not being taken seriously. I am not sure if I really want to stand up in-front on an audience and talk about a video game, I have no idea how my classmates will react or my parents.
The reason I "kinda" want to write and talk about SC2 is that I have dedicated a lot of time into this game, and I think it is one of the better things that have happened to me. My goal is to graduate from college and take a year off and try to play sc2, but I am really afraid of what people around me are going to say.
Any thoughts or suggestions would be really appreciated
Listening to people that are passionate about what they are speaking about is always interesting (Atleast for me). GL with your project and don't be afraid to show people what you love
my senior project was doing man stuff. to share it I ended up doing a couple blogs on TL. I ended up showing how many views i got and they gave me full points for sharing.
As Day9 once said, and I'm just paraphrasing: "The coolest thing is when someone shows their passion for what they love."
I've always found the above statement to be true. In general, people are very accepting of other people's passions, since usually they have their own secret passion and can sympathize with you. I've always wanted to be an astronaut, but although other kids grew out of it around age 10, I carry this desire with me to this day, and am rather vocal about it to my peers, even though I know that some people may find my desire to be a childish one. Now, although at first people were a little skeptical about my goals, often whenever they see me they always ask me to bring back a moon rock for them some day and tell me they respect me for having a dream and striving for it. In fact, my principal gave me an award certificate at the end of my senior year of high school for 'Most likely to be an astronaut'. Haha.
Also, who knows, maybe there are other kids (and maybe girls )in your class who love Starcraft, and this presentation could serve as an icebreaker and you may start new friendships with them.
Thank you guys. I have decided that I want to talk about E-Sports and SC2. I have also decided that I will be doing vlogs from time to time talking about my progress. You can expect an introductory vlog later today or tomorrow.
I am from Romania and currently living in the US and working on my senior paper for Literature as well, and from what I can tell, it's going to be a nightmare. Our senior projects aren't assigned yet, but I will definitely do mine on Starcraft and eSports when the time comes.
Here are a few tips that will help you succeed with your project: - Kids here are pretty good at oral presentations as they do this kind of stuff regularly. - KNOW what you want to say and HOW you want to say it. There's usually no in-between, you either know it and can formulate coherent and inspirational sentences out of your thoughts, or you don't and that usually results in failure - American kids love video games. Teachers usually don't. You have to find a way to convince them that Starcraft and eSports is not your usual "mindlessly shoot shit, get loot/points, win game". - They also love sports. But from my experience, every time kids have to do a project like this, they boil it down to sports for some reason. Make sure to strongly differentiate eSports from the regular "athletic" sports, or your presentation becomes the same thing they've seen a million times, but under a different name. - Learn how to make amazing visual aides as they enhance presentations by 10,000%. (prezi.com/powerpoint/posters) - Present the whole eSports scene, don't make it look like "Yea so I go home and play video games like all these other guys who get paid for it".
Don't freak out, you have about 4-5 months to work on it. If you pour your heart and soul into it, it'll become the most amazing thing your high school has ever seen. Good luck!
Ah I remember this project... I did mine back in 2004. The teacher let us all pick our subject and I got super stoked about being able to pick anything. My topic was literally 'the history of Squaresoft and Final Fantasy'. Research was horrible so about two weeks in I changed my topic to sexually motivated serial killers; particularly Ted Bundy, Jeffrey Dahmer, John Wayne Gacy, and Ed Gein.
When the day for the presentations came around I really regretted my decision. I learned so much about my class mates that day. One guy did a paper on 'street art and tagging' aka graffiti and vandalism. I never realized it was so complicated... he came in with all these cans and like 50 different nozzles. Another girl did her presentation on mixed martial arts, this was back well before I knew about MMA. It was so cool.
I remember how disappointed I felt when it was my time to present. All of my classmates had gone with something they loved and you could really feel that in their presentation. Not only that, but holy shit did I learn alot from that project. It was easily one of the most memorable times at high school. I felt so awkward giving a presentation about serial killers when most of my classmates did their project on subjects they were passionate about.
My advice to you is to do your project on what ever you feel passionate about. If it is eSports then do it on eSports.
I personally would do it on the history of Blizzard entertainment and then when you get to Starcraft do a bit on eSports. Although you're 16 so I doubt you have experience with Rock and Roll Racing or the Lost Vikings. But you mention you 'kinda' want to do it on esports which implies you have reservations in which case I'd say don't do it.
Also, your classmates will respect you. For me the worst part about my experience with the project was sitting through the presentations of the kids who had virtually no grasp of the English language. Those presentations were some of the most excruciatingly boring minutes of my life. Showing respect by not rolling my eyes was an act of endurance.
No tutorials for your presentation... that would be retarded. I'd suggest not even worrying about the presentation until it is time.
Talk to your teacher and ask her if you can go after most of your classmates so you can get an idea on how to do a presentation. Tell her some line like 'we don't do this in Norway' and I promise you she'll oblige you.
I'd then try and copy the presentation that was the most interesting.
At least that's what I'd do if I had a second chance.
Huh, it's not true for all American high schools and schools can vary a LOT based on state, specific district, public/private, teachers, demographics, etc. Mine never had a senior project (gahaha), just the same-old big projects that each class tends to have throughout the year. The public speaking or what teachers enjoy can vary. But yeah it's good to pour in passion and try to legitimize what you're talking about in everyone's eyes. Good luck!
On August 27 2012 14:17 Mattson wrote: No tutorials for your presentation... that would be retarded. I'd suggest not even worrying about the presentation until it is time.
Talk to your teacher and ask her if you can go after most of your classmates so you can get an idea on how to do a presentation. Tell her some line like 'we don't do this in Norway' and I promise you she'll oblige you.
I'd then try and copy the presentation that was the most interesting.
At least that's what I'd do if I had a second chance.
I did not mean make a tutorial for the presentation. Just something that I can do and then say I did, not show it.
Yeah... 11 minutes, I don't think I can handle that sorry. I watched to 2:10 to get the gist of your
Remember that the presentation isn't really that important part for your grade. The teacher is going to be mainly looking at your research paper. She wants to make sure you have an understanding of grammar. Also, she wants to make sure you know how to cite and when to cite. This is basically a prep for college.
The whole point of the actual presentation is to get you motivated on the thought of doing school work because when you get to college the papers aren't going to be this fun.
As for your product... copy this:
just make it like 5~10 minutes long and use your own words. Download replays and record them, use clips from cinematics, etc... lol I won't do it for you. Also, movies are 60% sound. Learn about audio levels and all that good stuff. You'll notice how this video I linked has music that continues to play albeit at a lower level.
When I say 'copy' the video I don't mean plagiarize it... but this is what your product aspire to be. Remember your classmates don't know anything about esports... if you can entertain your class then the question portion will be one of the most memorable moments of your life.
I remember when I did this project there were some presentations where people were rabid to ask questions and other ones where people only asked questions to be nice.
EPT
)in your class who love Starcraft, and this presentation could serve as an icebreaker and you may start new friendships with them.
